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Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Families Matter 07/25 by WorldOfInkNetwork | Blog Talk Radio

The Families Matter show airs live once a month on the 4th Wednesday of the month at 6pm EST - 5pm CST - 4pm MST - 3pm PDT

The idea of this show on BTR’s World of Ink Network is to have guests and listeners (adults or kids) share information to help empower children and their families.

Our July show topic is Empowering Our Children.

This month we have a special guest...our own Irene Roth. She is a freelance writer for kids, teens and tweens. Irene writes about empowerment, drawing on her expertise from philosophy and psychology. She holds a Masters Degree in Philosophical Psychology and writes in the area of autonomy, authenticity and empowerment.

Irene has a series of picture books for kids 3-8. Her first book Courage will be released at the end of this year through Halo Publishing. Irene has also written an empowerment book for teens entitled Seasons of Empowerment. This book should be released in late 2012 as well through Halo Publishing. Lastly, she is working on a book for older teens entitled The 7 Habits of Empowerment. This book should be completed by the end of 2012.

Welcome to the Seasons of Empowerment. In the sections that follow, I will argue that there are four seasons to self-empowerment for adolescent girls. The four seasons of empowerment resemble the four seasons of the calendar year. In other words, each season will become a metaphor for each stage of self-empowerment. I chose the seasons metaphor because self-empowerment is a complex, multi-staged process that doesn’t occur in any linear fashion. You have to develop many psychological skills before you can empower yourself to be who you truly are. Sadly, some of you believe you need permission to become who you truly are. This isn’t the case. In this book, I’ll show you how to empower yourself in your own terms. Here is a breakdown of the seasons.

First, there’s the spring season. During the spring, you will generally feel pretty vulnerable. This is very similar to how new plants fare in the spring. They aren’t deeply rooted yet. So, strong winds can damage you. In the same way, outside storms can catapult and hurt you because you’re not deeply rooted in yourself. As the tender plants in the spring, you are unsure of yourself and just beginning to become aware of your beliefs and values. During this time, your actions are usually inconsistent and unpredictable. You may also feel that it’s easier to just follow your peers or the media. One of the defining features of this season is that you will become much more self-assertive by taking the first steps to developing who you truly are.

During the summer season, you’ll get to know your beliefs and values more intimately and develop boundaries. This season is all about developing boundaries. This is similar to the summer season when plants are becoming rooted, and stronger to withstand storms. The same holds for you. You will become more rooted and not as prone to pressures from your peers. You will be developing boundaries to shield yourself from outside influences from your peers. During this season, you may still slide backwards and have difficulty asserting yourself in situations. Your emotions will still be tumultuous from time to time through this season. For this reason, one of the most important things you can do is to develop healthy boundaries.

During the fall season, you’ll become even more certain of yourself. Fall is usually a cooler time emotionally. It is a time for going inward, solidifying your values, and developing self-respect. This season is all about developing self-respect. During this time, you will assert your values more often. You’ll have the courage to tell others exactly how you feel as well. You’ll start to become aware of what you need in order to become empowered. You are also more likely to refuse to do anything you don’t agree with. One of the hallmarks of this season is that you will be becoming increasingly assertive and standing up for your beliefs and values in real situations. What a great feeling huh?

During the winter season, you will be becoming even more certain of yourself. This season is all about being yourself and becoming a free spirit. One of the hallmarks of the winter season is the need to turn inward to stay safe. You won’t allow others to manipulate you, and you will choose your friends carefully. You will assert yourself often because you’ll have the courage to be yourself. You won’t be peer-driven either. It is still possible for you to revert backwards from time to time during this season. However, you are least likely to do so when you are in the winter stages of self-empowerment.

I used the Seasons metaphor to bring forth the idea that self-empowerment is a fluid, non-static process. Most of you tend to dwell in the first two seasons simultaneously during their middle to late teen years. You can determine your own progress by becoming aware of where you are on the season continuum. Having a visual image of the seasons’ continuum can be very helpful.

About our guest:

Irene S. Roth is a freelance writer for kids, teens and tweens. She writes about empowerment, drawing on her expertise from philosophy and psychology. She holds a Masters Degree in Philosophical Psychology and writes in the area of autonomy, authenticity and empowerment.

A few years ago, Irene decided to embark on writing about empowerment for teens. She felt if she could reach teens and kids early on, they would have more of a chance to be empowered, balanced and successful. She’s seen so many unhappy teens in her teaching career. And she felt she wanted to do the best she could to help them. And this is the motivation behind these projects.

Irene has a series of picture books for kids 3-8. Her first book Courage will be released at the end of this year through Halo Publishing. Irene has also written an empowerment book for teens entitled Seasons of Empowerment. This book should be released in late 2012 as well through Halo Publishing. Lastly, she is working on a book for older teens entitled The 7 Habits of Empowerment. This book should be completed by the end of 2012.

Besides that, she is an Editor for Halo Publishing, and an Assistant Nonfiction Editor for Stories for Children Magazine as well as a college teacher.

PLEASE NOTE

*Stories for Children Publishing, LLC. (SFC) and its divisions do not receive any compensation for product reviews beyond a sample and/or limited access to a paid website. SFC donates all books sent for review to a charitable organization. SFC may do a contest or giveaway of samples we receive.